Similar Posts

25 Comments

  1. Brenda, you have such an artistic way of putting things together. I love the barn painting. I’m planning on buying a sofa like yours but smaller. More of a love seat. I’m moving from my home of 45 years and almost 2000 square feet to a tiny bungalow of 700 square feet. It will be a challenge but I’m doing it slowly as I’m dependent on my son and his time is taken up be his job and his family. I just need to be patient and keep in recognizing that this will be for the best. I hate paying rent but the responsibility of a home at 73 by myself ( and I’m handicapped on a walker) is just getting to be too much. I’m looking forward to living just down the street from my grands for the first time ever. They are 13 & 11 so they can just walk over for visits. This is the first year I’ve become concerned about living alone so far from family. I’m in SC and will be moving to just outside DC in Md. Any ideas about downsizing would be greatly appreciated. In fact, wouldn’t that make a great blog post ? Look forward to reading your writing every day.

  2. I have been enjoying your post from the beginning. Lately, I have not been receiving photos which are main point of your blog. I hate to lose you, can you help.

  3. The barn painting and the electric stove in the fireplace make such a cozy vignette! I don’t really change my decor for the seasons (although I used to when my son was young), except for adding a throw blanket here and there. If I’m having guests, I do set the table appropriate to the season. And, I do like to make lots of soups in fall and winter. Outdoors is a different story – I love to celebrate the seasons on my front porch and back deck. My favorite cozy winter item is my big, fluffy fleece bathrobe!

  4. Brenda, back again to give you this quote from Andrew Wyeth – ties in with what I wrote –
    “I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape. Something waits beneath it; the whole story doesn’t show…”

  5. Fall is pretty much my favorite season, so I have fun decorating my front porch, etc. Your new picture makes me feel cold (but it’s very pretty). Good thing you’ve got that new fireplace! I think your sofa along the wall looks fine. Those people that say you shouldn’t put your furniture along the wall have probably never lived in a small place. I know what you mean when you say it opened up your space. And we need to have that space to breathe, like you said. Everything looks great!

  6. I’ve always liked winter paintings,scenes best, even though I’m not a fan of winter. Perhaps it’s the simplicity of form that appeals, not really sure. I do like your simplification and cozy,pleasant style.
    I do less and less each year for seasonal changes. It seems as we grow older, we are perhaps more attuned to the elemental.
    Love dear Ivy. She is a queen indeed.

  7. I keep some farm winter pictures up all year. I find them comforting. I have a dura flame stove that I bought at Job Lot for $99.00 last year. It only has a window opening in the door so I can see the “flames”. It throws a lot of heat and I keep it in my den where I spend a lot of time.
    I love your posts and as I’ve simplified my life a lot, your posts speak to me.

  8. The barn painting is beautiful and the heating stove looks great in front of the fireplace! I decorate for every season. At this time we have our Halloween and fall decorations out and after Halloween is over out will come the Thanksgiving themed decorations and then on to Christmas!

  9. I have nothing to say that already hasn’t been said here. Just want to say, tho, LOVE it all!!!!!!!!

  10. The picture with the plants just says winter can come and I will be just fine. And the little bit of red always makes your home all you. The stove is in the perfect place. I recently read and remembered this phrase…..there is a reason for every season. It made such sense to me cause I like to change my home per season and with it, a new feeling is evoked inside of me. Fall and it’s rusts, brown, oranges and burnt red kinda make me feel like it’s time to prepare for cooler temps so think soups, casseroles, stock up on books and what makes you snuggle in. Then when winter hits I am not anxious as I have prepared and so out comes the red and green or silver and blue depending on what month as I like snowman scenery for January.

  11. The stove in front of the fireplace is just perfect. I know you will enjoy it a lot in the upcoming months. Hm, i just happened to think about who moved that couch? I hope you haven’t been bad!!

  12. It looks so welcoming…the fireplace is perfect…love it all…now I will go put out a few fall things and do some rearranging…lol…we cuddle up with soft blankets when watching TV with the 2 little dogs and and the new kitty and love our gas fire place…I have candles that come on at night and it is beautiful and cozy…I am a hot chocolate person too…sure enjoy your blog…makes my day💕

  13. Love the snowy barn. Queen Ivy is one lucky girl. You have made a cozy home for the both of you. I love simple decorating for the seasons not really the holiday. Pillow covers, throws and of course a custom embellished wreath for the front door. I am so thrifty using smalls found at the thrift store makes it easy to switch it up and make it feel fresh. Take care.

  14. I discovered u have to have a business to get anything cheaper at wayfair. So the electric heater is $304.99! So disappointing!

    1. I just looked. I would pay $304.99 for the bronze electric heater if I bought it today. I would pay less for the black one, $269.99, if I bought it today. The day I bought it was during a better sale. So I don’t know that that’s a business price. But the prices change all the time. When you’re checking them out, remember that the various colors are different prices as well.

  15. Well, I love to decorate for all the holidays, but my favorite time would have to be Christmas. I love all the pretty, twinkly lights, snuggling under a festive blanket, sipping hot chocolate with whipped cream and watching a Hallmark Christmas movie. The only thing missing is the fire place. That would be the icing on the cake for me. As I’m currently decorated for Halloween, I’ll probably enjoy snuggling under my Halloween colored crochet blanket and watching fun, not scary Halloween movies, like Hocus Pocus. Your home looks very cozy and inviting, exactly as you have it now. That really is the perfect place for your electric fire place. I love how it looks. Your new winter barn painting is so pretty too. And I LOVE Queen Ivy!

  16. I remember the painting with the red bar you had. Was that one of the items you gave to the nice handyman at your former apartment who did jobs for you on the side? I recall he had a couple of children and was trying to make a nice home for them. You also did a big clean-out of the famous “closet” at the former apartment that always sounded like a magic cave to me, because there was so much packed in it that it went on for miles! Ivy does look like a queen on her throne – and that throw pillow is gorgeous! I don’t recall seeing that before, would love one with that pattern and color for myself, it looks like a huggy kind of pillow. The Duraflame electric stove looks perfect in the fireplace opening. I can’t believe how fast the summer flew by, and all of a sudden we have autumn weather in SE Wisconsin and the trees are turning colors. That means I’ll have tons of raking to do because it seems how the wind circulates on my block everybody else’s leaves end up lining my driveway and clogging my front lawn! I get a good work-out this time of year. Today is one of those nice 70 degree days so I’ll be spending time out in the gazebo. Soon the curtains, area rug and furniture will be removed and hauled piece by piece to my garage for the winter. I delay that task as long as possible because I don’t like letting summer and warm sunny autumn days pass. My tomato plant, in a large planter on the patio, is still setting blossoms – we’re not ready for summer to be gone.

    1. That may have been where I parted ways with the painting. I just don’t remember. That throw pillow, if you mean the one in the photo of Ivy, came from World Market some time ago.

  17. Good morning,
    Every day I read your blog and enjoy looking at all the things you do…I have decided I live my dreams through you..we have almost exactly the same decorating ideas. I am a widow for the last 23yrs and somehow,helping others I ended up without a home/ place of my own. My story is very long , short version Is I will be 61 and am a care giver for a young woman with a brain AVM that is inoperable… So Please dont ever stop doing what you do..You have been a life saver for me..Thank You for all the beautiful pictures and words…with Love , Pam

  18. The stove has a perfect home! And, that painting above the fireplace is lovely.
    You’ve created a very cozy spot – life is definitely good!

Comments are closed.